Legacy of the Yondaime
by thebab91
Summary: The Akatsuki begins their assault on the world, only a few will stand up against them. But who are these few? And will they be able to stop the evil organization, or will the world fall to their power?


**Chapter 1: Fall of Suna  
**

**Part 1**

Naruto stood in the middle of a field. Rock Lee standing twenty feet ahead of him, Kiba about ten feet to his left, and Shino standing next to him. On his right was Shikamaru and Chouji, all of them crouched low to the ground, other than Rock Lee who was in his Lotus fighting style position. Naruto made eye contact with all of them, and inched his right hand toward his kunai pouch, sweat dripping on the side of his face.

Already anticipation was getting to him, he planned out his first move from his knowledge of their battle styles, which for a few of them wasn't too much as he hadn't really seen Shino, Kiba, Shikamaru or Chouji fight all too much since he had left Konoha three years ago. So this fight could go any way.

But, Rock Lee became too anxious and started them all off. In a giant cloud of dust and dirt that kicked off from where he was, he vanished and quickly found his way infront of Naruto. Naruto by then had pulled a kunai from his pouch and gripped it tightly with his right hand as he held it infront of his chest. Lee quickly threw two fists outward at Naruto's face, Naruto moved left of the first fist, and then right of the second, turning slightly as he moved. Naruto then returned his assault with jumping and leaning back so his legs were about level with the rest of his body, and then curling into a ball, and releasing his legs out like a spring at Rock Lee.

Lee took the kick into his left arm and was pushed back, dust and dirt once again kicked up as his feet dragged across the ground that he was pushed across. Kiba then showed himself standing to Naruto's left as Naruto placed both hands on the ground and did a back handspring onto his feet. Kiba threw a kick at Naruto, but Naruto's feral behavior allowed him to dodge it with ease. He retalliated by throwing his kunai across the field at Lee, and at the same time jumping up and turning to Kiba as he extended his leg out and tried to strike Kiba across the side with a spinning jump kick. However, Lee ducked underneath the kunai, and Kiba was also very feral and did a very gymnast-like lean back into a bridge so his hands and feet were touching the ground but his back was not.

And just as Naruto thought the assault was almost over, Chouji ran up to his right side with his arm about the size of a cart-stand. He threw a fist straight down on Naruto's body, but unfortunately only struck a clone that de-materialized from the hit. Uzumaki then reappeared as he jumped out from the ground underneath Kiba and struck his back with a fist, sending Kiba into the air.

Kiba rolled and tumbled about Mid-air, Chouji stood still waiting for another chance to strike, Shikamaru forming handseals on the side-lines, Shino following Shikamaru's behavior and Lee ran at Naruto. This all happened at the same time. Lee threw out another fury of punches and spun about throwing roundhouse kicks at Naruto inbetween the punches, but Naruto found his feet to the ground after a few punches to the gut. Naruto then continued on to block the punches and duck under or dodge by backing up a bit against the kicks. Nowhere could he get a chance to strike back though, Lee's style had improved from before.

But after a few seconds of this, Naruto finally found an opening when Lee was spinning about for another roundhouse kick. Naruto quickly formed a single kata and 4 clones appeared around him. The first clone caught the leg by the ankle with open palms, sliding back only a few inches against the pressure of the kick, and another clone tackled Lee over after the kick was stopped. Another of the clones ran out at Chouji as the other two decided to take down Kiba as he was now just getting back up after falling on his back after his trip through the air.

The fourth clone ran up underneath Kiba as Naruto followed. The clone kicked straight up with all of it's force sending Kiba back into the air, and Naruto quickly did a rolling summersault flip into the air above Kiba and extended his leg out on his final air-summersault to try and knock Kiba back to the ground at full force. However this was not like the Chuunin Exams, Kiba was prepared. He extended his left hand up and caught the kick before it was even swung. He then pulled his left leg up so his knee touched his chest and then extended it into Naruto's gut at full force. Naruto was thrown hard to the ground and was sent into a backward summersault which ended up with him laying face-down.

The clone that ran at Chouji was quickly dispatched as Chouji threw a backhanded slap at the clone using his enlarged right arm. The clone jumped over the hand, but was then crushed as the other arm was enlarged and then struck him into the dirt with an open palmed strike and the hand then slammed into the ground. The clone dematerialized like the other one had before.

The one that tackled Lee was finally thrown off and landed hard on the ground, dematerializing as the others. Now only Naruto and one clone was left. The clone ran over to his side as Kiba landed on the ground and the three shinobi that he was fighting close range stood up straight.

Naruto held out his right hand and the clone began to spin an Oodama Rasengan into his hand, Naruto smirking as the boys began slowly approaching him. But just as they were about to attack, the Rasengan took form. Naruto's clone went up in a poof of smoke and Naruto jerked his hand behind him, readying himself to strike. Bugs then emerged from beneath Naruto's feet and swarmed up his legs and formed a cuccoon around his body. A shadow then touched up agains the bugs and placed Naruto under Shikamaru's control. Shikamaru and Shino walked up to the bugs with a serious look upon their face and the bugs then returned to Shino. Naruto was left standing in the style that Shikamaru had taken. "Kage Mane, success."

Naruto smirked at what Shikamaru had said and then spat out his own words in return. "Kage Mane, unsuccessful." The clone then went up in a poof of smoke as all the others had done and appeared behind Shikamaru with a kunai to his throat. "That was fun. We should do this more often."

"We should." Shikamaru said calmly, as if the fact that he had captured a clone wasn't a suprise to him. Naruto's look went from confident to slightly weary as bugs began to crawl up his legs and then pulled him deep into the ground so only his head was above the ground.

Shino stood looking down at Naruto, crossing his arms as if to say 'you're too cocky.' But Naruto only laughed at this and pulled himself from the ground. This was easy enough for him to do as he had used the Earth Release so many times before. Lee offered a hand out for him, and Naruto took it gladly, pulling himself up to stand.

Chouji smiled coming up with an idea. "That was pretty fun. But now I'm hungry, lets get something to eat!" Everyone but Shino nodded in agreement and they all began walking back toward the village to feed their hunger Naruto leading the group and Shino following close behind.

**Part 2**

The sun was shining brightly in the Land of Wind, a thin layer of sand hovered and moved across the ground do to the strong winds. The Kazekage stood at his usual place, atop the rooftop of the administrations building. A small building in the middle of the village that bore the emblem of Wind on it's rooftop. It seemed just as another day in the Hidden Sand.

A disturbingly cold wind seemed to come from the entrance of the village, and the tingle on Gaara's face from how cold it was, only signaled that something bad was about to happen. Like a cold breeze on a beach, the cold had come from water, and allot of it. Before the Kazekage could even make a prediction, he saw it with his own eyes through the entrance of the village. A wall of water was heading toward the village, the wall being much higher than village's valley, it would flood the village if not stopped. The Kazekage looked down to the streets to a Suna Shinobi and nodded, the shinobi knew exactly what to do and began to evacuate the village. Other shinobi quickly began to join him on his quest to clear out the village of shinobi and villagers alike.

As this happened, Gaara, being the Kazekage, took on the responsability of stopping the wall of water. He quickly stepped forward onto the roof's ledge, and sand that had been under his feet rose him off the ground where the sand from his gourd flooded around his feet and lifted him into the air. He leaned forward on the cloud of sand that rose above the village, the cloud heading straight toward the wall of water which seemed only to be rising in the distance.

In no time flat he had made it to the valley entrance of the village, he jumped off the cloud landing atop the large wall with his feet only a foot apart and standing square to his shoulders as his body faced the approaching wave. The sand from the cloud dispersed and collected back into his gourd and he began to form handseals, his eyes fixated upon the water that neared.

After a few moments of forming handseals, he knelt down on one knee, and slammed both hands into the ground. Immediately a large barrier of sand only a few feet thick and a few feet higher than the waves rose up from the ground to keep the water from coming any closer to the village. Gaara shifted his weight onto his hand, trying to concentrate as much chakra as he could into the sand as possible to keep it from breaking when the water hit it. But it wasn't enough, upon the water striking the sand, the sand began to collapse. Ripples formed in the back of the barrier and cracks began to form. The wall was giving way. But the Kazekage was not about to give in to a wave of water. He released his grip from the ground for a moment to form a few more kata and then slammed his hands back down on the ground. The warm sand underneath his hands felt reassuring as another large wall of sand rase up behind the first barrier, and then slammed into the back of the first barrier to make it thicker and stronger. He then concentrated more chakra into and the barriers melded together.

After a minute or so of holding the ground, he finally released his grip. The water had been stopped, but only barely. The Hidden Sand had been saved. But only from the wave. The Kazekage lifted his head only to be in utter shock as he saw a thing that he had only hoped to see once in his life time. Two black cloaks flapped about in the breeze as an ocean-like wind took over the village in a cold, chilling breath. Red clouds seemed to wave about on these black cloaks, and hats were worn low over the eyes of these monsters to keep their faces hidden from view.

Though their apearances couldn't be seen, their heights and the large wrapped up weapon on the larger one's back made it obvious who they were. It was Itachi and Kisame of the Akatsuki, their reasons for showing up to the Hidden Sand were unknown, but Gaara knew it couldn't be good.

He stared at the two atop the wall, and didn't even have to move before a large clump of sand from his gourd struck out at the two members of the Akatsuki. He didn't need too much more of a reason to attack them beyond the fact that they were Akatsuki. That alone made them more dangerous than almost any other shinobi on the planet.

The large one pulled his right hand up to a handle over his left shoulder, then quickly followed with a diagonal swing, lifting his sword above his head before the strike, and then bringing it down across his front to strike the sand as it neared him. The chakra in the sand was instantly absorbed before it even got a chance to attempt an attack. And the sand was dispersed. The large figure got some sand in his eyes as the sand blew out in every direction after the chakra was taken from it, but he didn't even blink. He instead just continued to stare at the Kazekage, slowly returning his weapon to his back.

The large man didn't even need to make another move, that last display showed that he alone was more than enough to handle Gaara, and his weapon was obviously just made to defeat his sand. Gaara had no option in fighting that one, he'd have to call in some help if he wanted to try and take that one on. But as for Itachi, that was where the Kazekage would have his fight. That man was a Genjutsu expert, and would be his best bet for victory than to face the one known as Kisame.

Before he could act any further, five of the strongest Jounin from his village appeared behind him. Two of them being Kankurou and Temari. They were kneeling and awaiting for the Kazekage's orders. But Kankurou went on and talked to brief the Kazekage in on what the situation was. "We've secured all of the villagers, and the other shinobi are with them. Even if we are defeated, they're already on their way to Konoha. So if we lose, they're at least safe. And that also means, since there's no one in the village to worry about, you can fight to your fullest extent."

Gaara, for the first time ever felt confident in his fight. A slim sign of a smirk appeared upon his face as he continued his stare at the two figures above the wall. "Good. Kankurou, you're with me. Temari, take the others and distract the larger one while we face the smaller one." Kankurou and Temari nodded, understanding what to do. Temari jumped off with the other three Jounin and ran over to the other side of the canyon. Kankurou tossed a single scroll to the ground and placed a hand on it after biting his thumb and forming a few hand seals. Instantly, before him, his three puppets appeared, Karasu, Kuroari and Sanshouuo.

He smirked as he connected his chakra strings, and Gaara's formed a single hand seal, preparing for the fight.

**Part 3**

Naruto walked through the entrance, his stomach growling as he and the others seated themselves at the bar. "Hey Old Man, can we get some Ramen?"

"Just give me a minute. I've got other orders to fill you know."

After a minute or so, five bowls of ramen appeared before Naruto and the others. Chouji and Naruto were the first to dig in, the others eating a little slower. As Naruto and the others finished, a man with long white hair entered through the back of the restaurant. The man walked up behind Naruto, placing a hand on his shoulder. "Naruto, are you ready for your next lesson?"

Naruto turned his head to see it was Jiraiya. "Ero-Sennin... Of course!" Naruto exclaimed, jumping from his seat. Jiraiya then noticed they were all eating ramen and took out a bit of money from his wallet. He placed it on the counter to pay for the bill and then he left the restaurant. Naruto followed closely behind.

The two set off for another area, but Naruto knew exactly where they were headed. They bounded from the ground to the rooftops, and then began jumping from one to the next as they began heading toward Konoha's Village Gates. "Hey Ero-Sennin! Why are we leaving the village?" Naruto asked, but he was not answered. All he could do is follow in silence, Jiraiya continuing onward without giving one hint of telling Naruto the answer.

**Part 4**

The two figures leaped off the wall and down to the ground below as the area where they were just standing went up in a large explosion, a large burst of sand had shot forth from Gaara's gourd and had crushed that area of the wall. It then began to rebuild up before the sand shot back toward Gaara to recollect around his feet.

Itachi landed first, he didn't even seem to mind all the moving around, but seemed to be a little frustrated about something, as if he couldn't fight or something. Kisame smirked as he whipped his sword off his back and held it high over his head. "Itachi, remember the deal. This one's mine." Itachi didn't move an inch but Kisame knew he understood.

Gaara and Kankurou just stared at the two demons of the Akatsuki, Gaara's sand slightly raising off the ground as if it were preparing to protect him. Kankurou going into a jujitsu stance as if he was about to face one of them in hand to hand combat.

On the other side, now on top of the wall, Temari and the other ANBU stood. They were ready to spring their plan into action, however, the Akatsuki had plans of their own.

The two demons leaped forward, the smaller one jumping up back onto the face of the wall and begining to run up it as he pulled a kunai from his holster, the other jumping out toward Gaara and bringing his Samehada down on the young man's head.

Sand instantly shot up from the ground and wrapped around the tip of the sword and held it still. Gaara stared into the man's eyes, but the sand then began to move as the sword began to inch closer and closer to Gaara until a large amount of sand escaped from the top of Gaara's gourd and shot out in the shark man's chest. It pushed him back and he skid across the ground for nearly fifty feet. The man lost his sword in the process of being pushed back, the sword now being thrown aside by Gaara's sand.

Following the man almost instantly, a puppet flew across the field and stopped directly infront of him. It was Karasu, as it stopped, it's chest opened and poison gas flew up around the man known as Kisame, blinding him. It then began to circle around the man, throwing dozens of needles at him through it's arms. It then finished by charging into the poison mist, opening it's mouth and hoping to stab the man through the back with the poisonous spine that extended out from it's open mouth.

When the mist cleared, all that was seen was a large black circle. It was seeming as if it were made of scales. This is because, it was. The scales began to string along back to the sword handle as if each scale were interconnected by a wire, and the sword quickly reformed back in Kisame's hands, Kisame was standing inside the shell with the handle in his hand. After the sword reformed, It was seen by Kankurou and Gaara that the puppet was now in a hundred pieces, and that all of the needles had been deflected.

Kankurou's eyes widened, it was like watching his fight with Sasori all over again. "Boy, you have no where near enough skill to face me. Just quit while you still can." The large blue man then charged forward at Gaara, hopping left and then continuing forward after narrowly avoiding a geizer of sand which popped out from the ground. He pulled his sword to his side as he continued at Gaara, only increasing in his speed and not even having to jump aside anymore as he simply ran past the geizers before they could sprout from the ground.

Itachi kicked the last ANBU off the top of the wall, large holes and cracks all throughout the wall now, Itachi was left alone with Temari. Temari's eyes seemed to shudder at thinking of the man's power. She had just watched him completely destroy a squad of ANBU without difficulty, and now was to face the man. It seemed that she was in for some trouble.

"Great Cutting Whirl-wind!" She swung her fan, opening it to it's full size as she swung in a diagonal direction upward at the man. A large gale wind went in his direction, a few blades of wind in the mix struck out for him. But they failed. A large fireball suddenly shot forth from the man as he leaned forward. The wind was strong, but it only fed the flame making it larger than it originally was. It shot out for Temari and all she could do was watch as the giant ball approached her.

Sweat dripped down the side of her face as she saw her blades of wind being enveloped, the heat from the flame and the size of it were both tremendous. She fell back on her ass as she watched the flames come closer and closer until she couldn't watch anymore. She closed her eyes and waited for the enevitable.

A moment passed, and the heat seemed to die down. She opened her eyes and saw that there was a large wall of sand between her and the man. It had taken the impact from the large flame, and she was greatful as she knew it was her younger brother who had created it. She looked down to Gaara, who was just standing as he watched the blue man approach him. She smiled happily and then stood back up as she remembered she had a fight to win.

Kisame only formed one seal, with his left hand only, as he ran at Gaara. Five clones of water formed from water out of thin air, then quickly made actions as they grabbed onto different pieces of the puppet of Kankurou's, Karasu. One clone holding onto legs, the others arms or even the head. One clone even reverted back to water after kunai ejected from the mouth of the puppet. The head was then swung by Kankurou at the real Kisame who only winced it off as another clone of water appeared and broke the head into pieces with one heavy strike with a raging fist.

Kankurou's eyebrows twitched as his attempts proved futile against the Akatsuki member. Not one of his strikes were hitting. He decided to start up his strongest manuever. Quickly landing infront of the blue shark man, Sanshouuo popped up his shield and stood in guard of Gaara, who stood only feet behind the large puppet.

The shark man smirked as he took his sword in hand and swung the heavy blade down on the defensive puppet. In one blow, it seemed the puppet's defense had been shattered, but erupting from the broken puppet was Kuroari, another of Kankurou's puppets. Kuroari opened his chest up to reveal a trap which had ropes shooting out of it at the blue man. The Akatsuki member didn't move as he was pulled into the trap and was quickly caught in Kankurou's deadliest manuever. The arms and legs then released themselves from the grips of the clones, splattering the five remaining clones to nothing. They then all shot out at Kuroari and stabbed their blades into the open holes about the puppet. However, the trap was not complete as the head of Karasu had been smashed to pieces.

Water spilled from the sides of the puppet and Kankurou knew just what had happened. Kisame had escaped, and now they had to be on the defensive. Gaara's sand began to rise up around him, to keep a strong defense at all times. Meanwhile, more of Gaara's sand began mounding up behind Kankurou, to quickly surround him incase of attack from the member of the Akatsuki. Gaara then glanced over toward Temari to see how she was doing.

It had been unseen as to what had happened, but Temari layed now dead on the ground. Her eyes staring over at Gaara, a look of fear on her face. Itachi stood behind her corpse, watching the fight that Kisame was having with the two young Suna shinobi, his Sharingan eyes spinning rapidly.

The wall that had been deviding Temari and Itachi had been blown to bits, and Gaara felt a strange feeling overcome him. It was sadness, and at the same time anger. Tears fell down his face as he turned his attention back on the battle at hand. But as he turned, he found himself in an illusion. Darkness surrounded him, leaving him cold and alone in a world unknown. Memories of what he had seen beginning to come back to him.

Yashamura... The memories of his uncle overwhelmed him, and the memories of his father did as well. His life before meeting Naruto was dark and dreary, full of pain and misery. Sand began to circle around him in a spiral as if a twister had just taken form. Then, the recent image that he had just seen filled his eyes, as the image of his dead sister lay before him.

"TEMARI!" He yelled out in sorrow and agony. His brother falling to the ground next to her, in the same condition. His eyes watered even more as he began to see visions of the near future, the council all blaming Gaara for not protecting his siblings. Blaming him for their deaths. And to make things worse, his control over the Shukaku began to slip. Drifting into a trance, the Shukaku took form of the right side of his body, his body being split down the middle on what was controlled. And the control was only worsening, letting the spirit further in taking over his body.

Sand swirled about him and finally he looked like the image of the Shukaku once more. He screamed in pain, and hate for his self and what he once was. The Shukaku wasn't even within him, yet it was still a part of him, and it was taking him over.

Finally, things went black and Gaara was alone, crouched in the fetal position in the middle of darkness.

Gaara had been knocked unconcious and was laying on the ground. Kankurou, being the only one still concious from the group, began working on a strategy. Kisame neared the sleeping Kazekage with intent on crushing him, but Kankurou had something left in store. Suddenly, six puppet parts flew out from every direction and one even made contact with the blue swordsman, cutting his right arm, but injecting poison in him at the same time.

"Heh..." Kankurou then pulled himself up and ran past the blue man to grab his brother by the shirt collar. The puppet master then pulled one final jutsu as he slammed an exploding tag on the ground and then continued running. It went off, and when the smoke cleared, the two ninja were gone.


End file.
